call to end wild crafting & harvesting on unceded territories across the nation
Would you like to connect and join the conversation of informing commercial and boutique companies, settlers and trespassers that the poaching of flora is just as impactful as our fauna. Being part of the Herbalist community, I have witnessed the ongoing extraction of our resources. Please join me in holding up First Nation’s ethics, laws and way of life that our plant kin is not for foragers and wild crafter’s in our territories.
We can create change together. Would you like me to speak to your leadership committee or Band Chief & Council to identify how to protect our resources from ongoing extraction. Let’s talk ethics and stewardship.
Informed purchasing & solidarity in action with First Nation’s communities.
Ask your florist if their salal, ferns or seasonal fillers are poached or grown ethically? If your florist is not informed kindly ask for transparency for your future purchase or consider passing on their products they don’t have clarity around their sources. Ignoring red flags is also choice.
If you support local, small batch wild crafter’s, ask if they are self sufficient growers? Whose land they harvest from, what are their stewardship practices or how they navigate their First Nation’s relationships?
Support sustainable growers, local farmer’s, First Nation’s markets and cultivators or grow your own medicine, flora, and prepare for the seasons ahead.
We can make sustainable choices just as we can politely decline unethical suppliers and product makers. Solidarity should be respectful. Leave space for individuals, companies, makers to make the changes required to be inline with First Nation’s stewardship.
If you have concerns that a company isn’t operating ethically, best to simply ask them straight up. I do not support saviorism, shaming or slander, it is simply not our way.
If you are First Nation’s, engage in protocols to neighbouring nations when you are not within your own territory. Know who is their current Land Steward so they can advise you on contamination, overhead spray zones and other unsafe areas. Be prepared your neighbouring nation may have different practices or strategies for harvest management. Additionally, nation’s may have closed areas , ancestral burial or sacred sites/areas. I believe we should all harvest with consent as we always have respectfully recognized boundaries to ensure good relations with each other and our plant family.
